dox and glowplugboy,

Thanks for the kind words. . . I have found that forcing myself to keep a record of component weights really helps in making all of those little decisions along the way that add up to an overweight model. I've had many planes in the past that I didn't weigh until they were completely finished and then was shocked (Shocked!!!) at how much it weighed. Obviously, once the plane is finished it is almost a waste of time to weigh it since there is not much you can do to change the number. My last several airplanes were ARF's, so except for equipment selection I didn't have much control over weights of the individual pieces. However, on this plane I was able to knock 11 oz. off the finished weight before I even got my glue out by replacing the wing sheeting. When I ordered my vacuum bagging stuff, ACP offered 1/4" end grain balsa laminated with carbon fiber. Cutting out a new firewall from this stuff reduced the weight of this component over 50% - 40 grams to 18 grams. The same with replacing the heavy balsa bulkheads with honeycomb composite. The spreadsheet I'm keeping is updated with the current weight of everything, but I should have started a new column each time so I could see the weight reductions over time.

I have also found that the spreadsheet helps in future decisions on my "next plane". For instance, I used full-size servos on the ailerons, and digital mini's on the elevator. The digital mini's have more than enough grunt at 6V to run the ailerons so my next plane will use those on the wing, thus shaving off 30 grams, almost 1 oz. for no change in airplane performance. Also, while I used dual servos in the stabs to simplify the control linkages, I could easily have installed DEPS in the fuse and saved the weight (and $$$'s) of one mini servo - 26 grams (0.9 oz). While shaving 2 oz. off doesn't sound like much, if you do that 8 times your plane has now lost a pound. Like the politicians say - "A billion here, a billion there and pretty soon you're talking serious money!!"